<nettime> the reg: intel to kill floppy drives, serial ports next year

["nettime's_roving_reporter" <nettime@bbs.thing.net>]

     [via <tbyfield@panix.com>. presumably, this will be attended by 
      a load of marketing bumpf about 'innovation' and sentimental 
     'cultural' outpourings. personally, i never liked them, not that 
      CDs are any great shakes); but their salt-of-the-earth aspect 
      will become clearer, i expect, as it's forcibly replaced with 
      connectivity--particularly when people begin to see what the 
      alternative 'trusted source' will be: the servers of software 
      makers intent on protecting kontent. --cheers, t]

<http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/22034.html>

   Intel to kill floppy drives, serial ports next year
   By Tony Smith
   Posted: 04/10/2001 at 10:53 GMT

   Intel is finally inciting the death of the floppy drive and is calling
   on PC manufacturers big and small to stop supplying the once-capacious
   1.44MB removable drive in the latter half of 2002.

   So say confidential Intel documents seen by The Register. The chip
   giant wants OEMs to phase out the floppy in the second half of 2002.
   It hopes they will pull the plug - as it were - on PS/2 and serial
   ports at the same time.

   The parallel port will be with us for a little while longer - Intel
   has yet to timetable its demise. And we note that corporate-oriented
   PCs will continue to ship with floppy drives after their consumer
   counterparts have ceased to do so, according to Intel's technology
   roadmap.

   Mac users have long been forced to live without legacy ports and
   floppy drives after Apple CEO Steve Jobs struck them off the company's
   spec. sheets some years back. We can't say we miss 'em since any file
   that can be fit on a floppy can be emailed to another user in moments.
   PC types seem to hang on to their outdated technologies with rather
   more passion than their Mac counterparts, which is the only way of
   explaining why there are so few 'legacy-free' PCs out there and why
   the ones that are tend not to sell as well as their port-packed
   alternatives.

   Vendors tend to see that as a sign that people want serial, PS/2,
   parallel etc. and not use USB and 1394. But unless you force people to
   change, as Apple did, it's impossible to say whether demand for older
   ports is intent or inertia.

   Intel's technology roadmap also tells us we'll see Bluetooth wireless
   connectivity appearing on new machines, initially via a USB module, in
   consumer and pro PCs during the first half of next year.

   In that timeframe we can expect to see PCs shipping with add-in Serial
   ATA cards. Integrating Serial ATA on the motherboard won't happen
   until the first half of 2003, Intel reckons. USB 2.0 will be
   integrated into the motherboard during 2H 2002. ®





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